Blogs

Employment Law

Paid Leave Law in Montgomery County Maryland Is Expanded to Include Paid Parental Leave

On October 1, 2016, Montgomery County, Maryland (the “County”) joined the growing list of jurisdictions requiring paid sick leave for employees of all entities doing business in Montgomery County. The County’s Earned Sick and Safe Leave Law (“Paid Leave Law”) is applicable to all employers doing business in the County. This week, the County Council…

November 7, 2016

Construction

New Owner-Occupancy Rules for Condominium Developments

Effectively immediately, The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) has implemented new owner-occupancy rules regarding existing condominium developments. The owner-occupancy requirement for most projects has been lowered from 50% to 35%. The lower percentage only applies, however, if certain requirements are met: applications must be submitted under the HUD Review and Approval Process option, owners need to…

November 4, 2016

Business and Financial Services

Mandatory Paid Sick Leave Comes To Montgomery County Maryland

The Earned Sick and Safe Leave Law Montgomery County, Maryland (the “County”), has recently joined the growing list of jurisdictions requiring paid sick leave for employees. According to County legislators, paid sick and safe leave is necessary to promote the health and welfare of County residents and safeguard County employers from unfair competition from neighboring jurisdictions. Effective October 1, 2016, entities doing business in the County must be in full compliance with the Earned Sick…

October 19, 2016

Business and Financial Services

The Public’s Right to Access Trumps Trump University’s Confidentiality Claim

Pushing aside the political issues that seem to overwhelm the subject, the litigation involving Donald Trump and Trump University, now pending in the Southern District of California, demonstrates how a person’s status as a public figure can limit his ability to restrict access to confidential material during litigation. On May 27, 2016, in a class-action suit filed against Trump University, LLC (“TU”), United States District Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel ordered the unsealing of several…

June 20, 2016

Business and Financial Services

Creative Pleading in Business Torts

On January 5, 2016, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Newport News Division, handed down its Memorandum Opinion & Order disposing of two motions to dismiss filed in Tax International, LLC v. Kilburn and Associates, LLC et al . In denying these motions, Judge Raymond A. Jackson provided a succinct exposition of several federal pleading and practice rules while providing an assessment of the law on business torts in Virginia. Tax International alleged that former…

May 20, 2016

Business and Financial Services

Uber Reaches Settlement of Independent Contractor Misclassification Lawsuits in California and Massachusetts

Last week, Uber, the on-demand ride-hailing service, reached a settlement of two class action lawsuits pending against it in California and Massachusetts. These were filed by Uber drivers who claimed that the company had misclassified them as independent contractors instead of employees. The settlement is pending approval by the federal district judges overseeing the cases. The California and Massachusetts lawsuits reportedly cover more than 385,000 Uber drivers. Similar class action law suits…

May 20, 2016

Employment Law

NLRB to Begin Targeting Employer Misclassification of Workers as Independent Contractors as an Unfair Labor Practice

With the Complaint issued recently by the National Labor Relations Board’s (“NLRB”) Regional Director in Los Angeles, the NLRB appears poised to enter the fray on the issue of employer misclassification of workers as independent contractors instead of employees. The NLRB’s Complaint alleges that Intermodal Bridge Transport “has misclassified its employee-drivers as independent contractors, thereby inhibiting them from engaging in Section 7 activity and depriving them of the protections” of the…

May 19, 2016

Employment Law

New DOL Regulations on FLSA Overtime

Editor’s note: A federal district court has granted a preliminary injunction blocking the overtime rule from taking effect December 1, 2016. The U.S. Department of Labor will today unveil new regulations effectuating significant changes to the payment of employee overtime under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The new rule will raise the salary…

May 18, 2016

Business and Financial Services

Virginia Attorney General Says Virginia Law Prohibits Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity and Perhaps Sexual Orientation

For Virginia employers who have not already updated their EEO policies to include prohibitions against discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation, the time may have come to make those changes. Last week, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring made it official, issuing an advisory opinion in which he concluded that the Virginia’s Human Rights Act’s ban on discrimination on the basis of “sex” also prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity and, possibly,…

May 18, 2016

4th Circuit Rules that a Virginia School Board Violated Title IX by Preventing a Transgender Male Student from Using Boys’ Restroom

A sharply divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond ruled 2-1 last week in the case of G.G. v. Gloucester County School Board that a Gloucester County School Board regulation limiting the use of student restrooms and locker facilities to a student’s biological or birth gender was impermissibly in conflict with a U.S. Department of Education (“DOE”), Office of Civil Rights (“OCR”) interpretation of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (“Title…

May 6, 2016